THE TIMES (UK) Viva La Vida Review (+ unseen picture)

[the_escapist]

June 6, 2008
Coldplay: Viva La Vida
Pete Paphides

Risk schmisk. An album just like the last one – now that really would have been a risk for Coldplay. But pre-release murmurs that their new album represents a leap into the unknown put you in mind of someone being made to walk the plank and them saying they fancied a dip anyway.


The fact is that there’s no reason to believe that Coldplay are a gambling band. For album two, A Rush of Blood to the Head, they super-sized the formula that had worked so well on Parachutes. Having gone global, prudence prevailed with album three. X&Y stacked up unspecific stadium anthems that, in emotional terms, seemed to do the same job as the American condiment Tony Fatso’s Everything Sauce. No wonder EMI’s new owner, Guy Hands, loves them. With his experience in private equity and Coldplay’s safe, steady growth, he would have seen their portfolio as a low-risk, high-return investment.


Coldplay don’t take their part in all this lightly. With the help of their co-producer Brian Eno, the most welcome addition to their sound is a sense of motion and eagerness to get to the next idea, rather than merely pumping up the same one for four minutes.


The exploratory trips to South America are theoretically audible in the acoustic syncopations and handclaps of Cemeteries of London – and yet Coldplay’s flamenco rattles like the rolling stock of an intercity train. Chris Martin’s period spent stalking Arcade Fire is represented on the rallying whoops of Life in Technicolor but, by jettisoning any other vocals for a dulcimer, the song should sound fantastic rather than functional when they haul it around the stadiums.


Strings – the thick, woozy Eastern kind favoured by Beatles and Bunnymen – loom large on several songs, most notably on the excitably Nymanesque Viva la Vida and Yes. On the latter Martin sings wearily: “I’m just so tired of this loneliness,” in a manner more like that of the pop star known to fly off the handle at paps who impinge on his family life. After about a minute of Martin’s plaintive ivory-stroking, 42 is Magazine attempting Kashmir on six too many espressos. With the bedside manner of a doctor visiting a terminally ill patient, Martin opens Death and All His Friends with hushed reassurances before his band spring to life and roles suddenly become reversed. “I don’t wanna follow death and all his friends,” shrieks the singer.


According to Eno, what it all amounts to is the sound of a band “living at the edge of their possibilities”. Such precisely worded praise could just as easily apply to the logic-defying leaps of inspiration found on a Radiohead album as it does a band of rather talented musicians desperately trying to stay interesting.
Mostly, Viva La Vida betrays the touch of conscientious artisans rather than the lateral lightning flash of genius. Either way, though, the good news for Guy Hands is that it sounds like a million-seller. Great. Now he can go ahead and drop everyone else.


(Parlophone, TMS £11.99, call 0845 6026328)

http://entertainment.timesonline.co....cle4074281.ece

[Lore]

what a cool picture!

[Drakdaddy]

Someone translate this review

[Hotplay007]

gah whats with the acrobatics in this band? Both Chris and Guy...

[nevaehdreamz]

I really hate reading shit and then after I've read it I think, "What the hell did I just read?"

[ApproximatelyInfinite]

dude, what a picture! this is the second one like this...whoa. they're getting a bit intense, aren't they?

[zsub]

i think the review can summed up like this;

some great songs, some copying other bands, nothing innovative, but still solid and a great seller

[Space Cadet]

Snarkfest city. Further proof that music journalists are MOR trend following sheep every bit as much at the bands they criticize for being MOR trend following sheep. Kind of explains why X&Y kept getting 5 stars in all the same publications last time.

So I take it almost all of the reviews this time around are going to be snarkfests as well.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Hotplay007;2376893
gah whats with the acrobatics in this band? Both Chris and Guy...

---

I think they're all from the same photoshoot. I really want to know how they did it, though. Trampoline? But I don't see one. He looks like he should be breaking his neck in a second.

[Zemy101]

That must be Chris bringing the "puppet on a lonely string" line to life, then. Huh.
Ok that was awful, but its getting late over here

Anyway, the review was a bit odd, but I get the feeling they like it, sort of. Almost like they're scared to give it too much praise. Thanks for posting!

[ApproximatelyInfinite]

i'm thinking harness, with the strings photoshopped out. unless they're really daring and actually did a flip like that on a trampoline, but i wonder if EMI would like them doing something like that

[ricardo]

the picture is awesome! but hell this is not a review I mean they just describe it I really don't understand this reviews if I were somebody who has n't heard the album I would not know what to expect. It's kinda intricate. They just said it will have succes but they don't say wheter is good or not

[Hotplay007]

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Zemy101;2376920
That must be Chris bringing the "puppet on a lonely string" line to life, then. Huh.
Ok that was awful, but its getting late over here

Anyway, the review was a bit odd, but I get the feeling they like it, sort of. Almost like they're scared to give it too much praise. Thanks for posting!

---

HAHA... puppet on a lonely string.... that's hilarious

[ricardo]

maybe we'll have to wait until it is realeased to get the final veredict. But seriously I like more Rolling Stone reviews eventhough they are just the "music in 60's were better" (I highly disagree) magazine.

[frostbitepanda]

Reviews suck. Even good ones. The only one that actually makes sense and doesn't just summarize the album while simultaneously comparing it to every big name-drop-worthy band they can think of is the one MTV did. MTV, media world. You should be ashamed.

[Pallavi]

that picture of Chris falling down just really stunned me!